Bell Tower Talks podcast offers new way to keep students informed

When Ethan Campbell hits upload, Trevecca students will have a new way to keep up to date with campus news no matter where they are.

Bell Tower Talks is Trevecca’s newest podcast that covers announcements, sports updates and events on campus. Each 30-minute episode will feature a special guest with Juniors Ethan Campbell, communication studies major, and Joshua Moore, media arts and studies major, as the hosts.

The bi-weekly podcast will be available on trevechoesonline in partnership with the multimedia journalism program.

“It’s meant to be more conversational, and that’s what our main goal is, is to kind of break down [what] you call the formal barrier of Trevecca,” said Moore. “We just want people to talk. We want to get people’s stories kind of like . . . TrevEchoes. You’re interviewing people all around campus, you’re getting people’s stories as well, I just think that podcast is a different medium to tell that.”

The duo began planning episodes this summer initially for SGA announcements but developed into a campus life podcast after collaborating with Trevecca faculty members, SGA and the multimedia journalism program.

“When Ethan contacted me about making the podcast part of the online student newspaper I was so excited to work with he and Josh,” said Jo Ellen Werking Weedman, assistant professor of communication students and faculty advisor of The TrevEchoes, Trevecca’s student newspaper. “We want our students to be storytellers who can use all mediums and their goal of keeping students informed fits exactly with the student newspaper’s role on campus.”

Campbell and Moore hope the podcast will make it easier to circulate information and bring more awareness to non-residential students, especially those who aren’t involved in clubs and afterschool programs.

“We both came to it from the position of being commuters and being communication majors where, until this year, we had all of our classes on the dark side of campus: in the annex,” said Campbell. “The idea of a campus life podcast would be that it’s something easily consumed . . . You could be doing something else when you’re listening to a podcast.”

The team each have their designated roles. Campbell is in charge of the technical side while Moore does the research and leads the segments, both haven’t received formal training and are primarily self-taught.

With the help of Trevecca PR, the two are working on rebranding the show and making it an official organization to be passed on after they graduate.

“A lot of the stuff I’ve learned about podcasting is that it’s its own form of social media. You’re expected as a podcaster to have interaction with your audience,” said Campbell. “Hopefully, we’d be able to grow a little community around it.”

Bell Tower Talks will air eight episodes this semester, some of which are seasonal, every other Sunday at 2 p.m. on Apple Podcasts, SoundCloud and Google Podcasts. Changes in the TrevEchoes website will also allow students to listen to Bell Tower Talks at trevechoesonline.com. Students that want to ask questions to upcoming guests can send them on Twitter at @BellTowerTalks.